The Vowel Quadrilateral Chart

The Vowel  Quadrilateral Chart

              *                                                                               *       

 High            i:                                                                        u:      

                     I                                                                       U

   

 Mid               e                                3：                             (Ɔ)Ɔ:

                                                          ә                                 ɒ

                        

 Low                  æ                                       ʌ                    (a) α :   

                 *                                                                                   *

                        Front                           Central                    Back    

 

The Vowel Quadrilateral Chart shows the cross-section of the tongue.  The vertical line shows the height of the speech sounds:  High, Mid or Low.  The horizontal line shows the advancement of the tongue:  Front, Centre or Back.       

The vowel phonemes are arranged based on the position and height from high to low and from front to back according to the Vowel Quadrilateral Chart . 

There are 12 monophthongs:  7 short vowels and 5 long vowels with colon marked immediately after the symbols like /i:/. 

There are 8 diphthongs  arranged according to the second phoneme in the combination:  / I /, / ə / and / ʊ /.   It involves the glide of the first sound to the second speech sound.  For example, the diphthong / eI /, it is / e / phoneme glide to / I /   phoneme.      

          *   I

             e                               Ɔ

                                               a

                             Diagram 1

( I do not know how to draw all the lines from /e; Ɔ;  ...... / towards I.  You draw the lines from the 3 speech sounds towards I to show the glide of the sounds to I..) 

                  
                    I

                                                             U                                

                      e                              

                                               * ə                                                 

                           Diagram 2
     The speech sounds glide towards /ə/.

                                                                      *ʊ

                                          ə
                                                         
                                                                    a  

                                     Diagram 3 
       The speech sounds glide towards /U /.

For triphthongs:  just add / ə / to the diphthongs No. 13, 14, 15, 19 and 20 to produce / eIə /,  / Ɔ Iə/,  / aI ə/       / ә U ə/ and / aUə/         vowel speech sounds.